I think we’ve all deserved a little break. I mean, I know I do, and that our heroes do, so I’ll just arrogantly assume the same is true for you. In case it isn’t, I’m sorry, but you’re getting this little break, anyway. It would have been too much effort to draw two different strips and create a landing page that asks people whether they feel they’re deserving of a break before rerouting them to the appropriate strip. I’m sorry, but we’re all in this together.
This strip is mostly based on the fishing minigame in Breath of Fire IV, but the slightly bizarre effect is the same for many other minigames in Japanese-style RPGs. In BoF IV, you could pass by a location for the minigame while being in hot pursuit of some evil-doer…and if you took the opportunity to step into the location, you could spend as much time as you want fishing, enjoying the scenery and the soothing music, refining your fishing techniques, working on completing your trophy collection…and then step back out again and still be as close on the heels of your target as before. It kind of made me laugh out loud when I first encountered that, but if I remember correctly (it was 18 years ago, or so), I grew quite fond of those little breaks spend in the fishing minigame by the end.
So I’ve decided to give the characters the same kind of break, and they all seem to be enjoying it appropriately. I don’t really think any of them was into fishing before, but if the alternative is a hopeless fight against an overwhelming horde of inhuman monsters, I’m sure you can learn to love fishing quite quickly. It’s always just a question of the motivation.
Don’t worry, by the way…while Snuka is right that it’s actually quite irrelevant how much time they spend fishing, I’m not going to avail myself of the opportunity to run several weeks of fishing strips now. A small break in a tense situation might be okay, but you shouldn’t overdo it. And while I’m know for drawing gags out far longer than I should, I keep working on myself every single day. =P
More on Monday.